British funnyman Sacha Baron Cohen has signed on to play the classic 1934 comic book illusionist “Mandrake the Magician.”

Based on Lee Falk’s newspaper comic strip of the same name, Variety reports that Cohen will play the mysterious Leon Mandrake, a magician that uses hypnotism to fight villains, “gangsters, mad scientists, extraterrestrials and characters from other dimensions.” The project, more than a decade in the making, will be directed by Etan Cohen, who made his directorial debut in “Get Hard” and who’s writing credits include “Tropic Thunder,” “Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa” and “Men in Black 3.”

Cohen has proven to be a master character actor, with memorable roles as “Borat,” “Ali G” and “The Dictator,” he can currently be seen as Time in “Alice Through the Looking Glass.”